


An Aggressive Courtship

by burnthebones



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dubious Consent, M/M, Manipulation, Mind/Mood Altering Substances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-14
Updated: 2013-02-14
Packaged: 2017-11-29 05:38:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/683456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnthebones/pseuds/burnthebones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You trust me, then,” he says. His voice is still level. Almost monotonous.</p><p>"What kind of a cockamamie question is that? Of course I trust you."</p><p>"Good. Then take your mask off."</p><p>You stare at him. It's pretty hilarious, actually. Your mouth is hanging open and everything, and even if he can't see it, you like to think he knows. Because it's a joke. He's trying to get a rise out of you. Dirk Strider and his line-toeing skullduggery! You laugh again. It's all air this time.</p><p>“Oh, yes—just let me slip out of this right quick and enjoy some of the nigh unbreathable miasma that passes for air on your planet! You’re a riot, Strider—a right bully jokester, top notch!”</p><p>You serarch the glossy black of those pointed shades for some indication of—well, anything, really, but all you find is your own reflection. It’s <em>not</em> a joke. He’s serious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Aggressive Courtship

**Author's Note:**

> Originally inspired by [this](http://msphamletmachine.tumblr.com/post/35772396817/what-if-dirks-aggressive-courtship-demanded) piece of fanart by HamletMachine.

It's not the tallest tower in sight, but it's certainly quite a hike. Not for the first time, you congratulate yourself on your excellent choice of legwear. Not only do these shorts make your thighs look smashing, but the range of motion is fantastic. They're just tight enough to keep out of your way without being constricting, unlike your old cargo shorts which, while undeniably comfortable, got hung up on damn near everything. It's hard to be a successful adventurer when your pants are getting caught on every other bramble and jagged outcropping. Especially considering that adventuring is roughly 70% brambles and jagged outcroppings.

The two of you stop to catch your breath between floors. At least, you do. The inside of your gas mask has gone all cloying and humid with the effort of bounding up so many dag nab stairs. Straight out of a rather harrowing scrum, at that! You actually darted into this tomb to shake the next wave of maroon skeletons shambling your way. As much as you love a good fight, the blasted things never seem to quit coming, so you didn't bother protesting when Dirk grabbed your arm and tugged you through the closest mossy-green archway.

He's at one of the room's tall, glassless windows, leaning through the opening and watching the parade of skeletons several storeys below. You'd say he barely looks rustled at all, but his own mask makes it difficult to say for certain. What you can observe, though, is the steady, unlaboured rise and fall of his chest and the pointed lack of Vader-esque huffing that's coming from your own covered face. It doesn't seem right for Strider to be so composed while you're half-bent, puffing like an asthmatic. It's not like you're out of shape--egad, no! With all the jungle-trekking and monster-battling and robot-sparring you've done in your day, you'd hazard to say you're in pretty tip-top shape, actually. Yet there you are, and there he is, and you take the opportunity to size him up a bit while his back is turned.

Dirk's no paunch-bearing slouch himself. He's leaner than you, with narrower shoulders, more wiry than he is built, which makes him look taller than you think he actually is (though part of that you attribute to his vertically-coiffed 'do). Despite its inherent rightness, you shy from calling him "willowy" because it sounds so frigging delicate, and Dirk Strider is anything but. You've gotten to know him here in the medium (or his body language, anyway; he's still insufferably enigmatic in just about every other realm). You've had time to watch him, you've run with him, fought with him, and if you've learned anything, it's that he's very deliberate. You tend to throw yourself into the fray with lots of gusto but little actual planning. You realize this is probably not the smartest approach to a life-threatening situation, but you've gotten by just fine so far on boyish pluck and your considerable skill with firearms. You like to play things by ear and you're a big advocate of trusting your instincts.

But Dirk is calculated in a way you can't really fathom. It seems to you that his most spontaneous motion is still less so than your most contrived, and you spend an awful lot of time wondering what's going on behind those shades.

Like now, for instance. And they're trained on you rather suddenly, and you look away to avoid the embarrassment of "being caught" despite the relative ambiguity of your gaze under this stupid mask. You pretend to take an interest in your surroundings. This particular chamber is vast and dull with grey-green dust, empty save for a few massive stone slabs whose purpose you haven't quite discerned (though you're not a total bone head--you assume them to be funereal). You think you spy a skull or two in the far corner, but it's difficult to get excited about them at this point. _Every_ chamber has been echoing and desolate, and you've seen at least 14 skulls in as many days. You hate to admit it, but they're getting a bit tired. On the whole, though, this has been a downright capital expedition. A dream come true! Tombs to raid, terrific fiends with which to throw down the old gauntlet, wardrobe changes--and all with your best pal.

Who's still looking at you. You think.

Electricity carves sloppy geometric shapes across the sky beyond the window. The first time you saw it, you thought it was just lightning, but it's not like any lightning you've ever seen. It clings to itself like socks fresh from the dryer. Knots itself into tight, volatile nests that drift through the atmosphere. You feel like they should be louder. They should crack and and sizzle and be sort of unbearable, but they only thread a low hum through the gas-heavy air. You feel it more than hear it. It unsettles your stomach.

So does that look. That look you can't actually see but are pretty confident is there. Like he's decided something without you and is about to let you in on it, but you're not so sure you want to be part of the club.

"So!" you say. Your muffled voice echoes through the chamber and comes wobbling back to you. "Hell of a skirmish, that! These bony ne'er-do-wells are pretty rough-and-tumble."

"Mm," he answers. "I'm surprised you let me pull you out of there. Jake English, led away from a challenge?" He leaves the picturesque framing of the window to stand closer to you. A lot closer to you. That's another thing about Dirk--he's either yards away from you or right at your elbow. There is no in between, and you have to wonder if he's trying to unnerve you. Things with him always feel a little like a test, like he's pushing your limits--but it's always been that way, hasn't it?

You laugh. You caught your breath several minutes ago, but the sound is still full of air. "Well, chap, it wouldn't ordinarily be the case, let me assure you! So don't be spreading that codswallop around, Strider. You'll blacken my hard-won reputation as a formidable scrapper."

"Perish the thought. What kind of guy do you take me for? Actually, don't answer that." You don't. You aren't sure how to, anyway. If you're being frank with yourself, you're a lot more conflicted about your chum than you're comfortable admitting. That making-out-with-his-disembodied-head thing really threw a wrench in your gears. Every last one of them. You were coming to terms with some things, you think. You were working hard to sort out your feelings, and then--that. And you realize it was necessary (at least, that's what Dirk's told you several times now), but dammit, that's not how you wanted it to go! You feel like the whole kit and caboodle's been a giant roadblock on the path to true, unfettered compatriosity.

"Seriously, though," he says. "I thought you'd put up more of a fuss."

You shrug. "I reckon I sometimes get a little--carried away? You know, in the rush of the firefight, guns blazing and such. If there's anyone I'd trust to bail me out lickety-split when I get in over my noggin, I think it'd be you."

You can't see his face, but something changes. You aren't sure what gives it away--the set of his shoulders, maybe. The way his fingers curl at his sides or how he leans toward you so subtly you'd probably never notice if you hadn't seen it a hundred times going toe to toe with Brobot. Dirk is on the offensive. Fuck, was that the wrong thing to say? It seemed pretty goldurn innocuous as it left your mouth, but--

"You trust me, then," he says. His voice is still level. Almost monotonous.

"What kind of a cockamamie question is that? Of course I trust you."

"Good. Then take your mask off."

You stare at him. It's pretty hilarious, actually. Your mouth is hanging open and everything, and even if he can't see it, you like to think he knows. Because it's a joke. He's trying to get a rise out of you. Dirk Strider and his line-toeing skullduggery! You laugh again. It's all air this time.

"Oh, yes--just let me slip out of this right quick and enjoy some of the nigh unbreathable miasma that passes for air on your planet! You're a riot, Strider--a right bully jokester, top notch!"

You search the glossy black of those pointed shades for some indication of--well, anything, really, but all you find is your own reflection. It's _not_ a joke. He's serious. You drop your nervous jollity like a bad habit and shake your head.

"Are you fucking crazy? I'm not gulping in lungfuls of this crap!"

"I thought you trusted me."

"I bloody well do, but--"

"You don't, Jake." His hand is under your chin. It isn't the first time he's touched you, but those moments have been so infrequent that you still have no idea how to handle it. And he's always so dadblasted _cocksure_ about it, like there's no way in hell you'll smack his hand away and tell him to get bent, and--well, you haven't exactly proved him wrong. His bare fingertips skirt the edge of your mask, following that hard line up the side of your jaw, but you know he won't go any farther. He wants _you_ to do it. "You think I'm asking you to do something dangerous."

"You frigging are!"

"I rest my case."

That conflict thing rears its no good, homely cranium again, because you know what he's doing. He's baiting you. And it's working. Nobody calls Jake English a liar! Because you're _not_ a liar--you really do trust him! He's your brommander in chief, the Smith to your Wesson, your most esteemed comrade in arms. If he's asking you to take off your mask in his planet's stupid, gas-saturated atmosphere--

You suck in a very noisy breath and stare at your doubled reflection. You have to believe that Dirk would never put you in the way of serious harm. Getting your ass handed to you by the scoundrel of a robot he programmed to do exactly that is one thing--the elusive heap of parts has also saved your skin on more than one occasion. This is something different.

You bring your hand up to bat his away harder than stictly necessary, because you want him to know your feathers are a touch ruffled at the moment and you are not going to take any more of his Strider bullshit. If he wants you to prove yourself, you'll prove yourself. You can play this game.

Both your hands navigate to the back of your head and loosen the straps holding the gas mask in place. Your whole face relaxes a little as the bite of hard plastic recedes, and you hesitate. You stand there, probably looking a bit of a fool with your arms behind your head, elbows jutting out, keeping the mask tugged into place, and it's do or die. You steel your jaw in the manliest fashion with which you are acquainted, take a real bang-up shot at swallowing the lump in your throat, and pull the mask free.

Nothing happens. The air doesn't smell any different, doesn't taste any different than what you're used to, though it doesn't fill your lungs in quite the same way. The breaths you take are deeper and less satisfying, but you think you can handle it. You raise your chin a little defiantly and look Dirk right in the glasses.

"There! Are you satisfied, you inscrutable jerkwad?" You clutch the mask loosely to your chest and let Dirk see just how irritated with him you are, your eyebrows pulled together and the corner of your mouth quirked rather noticeably downward. Unsurprisingly, there's no reaction from the false face peering back at you. "Aren't you going to say anything? Some apologetic affirmation of my unwavering faith in the word of Dirk bloody Strider?"

If there were crickets in this tomb, you would hear every last one of them. As it stands, all your straining ears can catch are the clattering march of bones outside and the sibilant throb of a nearby cluster of electricity. You get the impression Dirk is waiting for something, but you've had about enough of this tomfoolery. You lift your mask. Dirk's hand lands swiftly atop it and prevents it from rising any higher than your tie.

"Not yet." That confidence again.

"Not yet," you parrot, then shake your head. You feel warm. You think your face might be sweating. "Dirk, I don't think this is--"

There's his hand again. On your neck this time. He pushes your mask down, out of the way, and ghosts his fingers along your throat. For a second, you're sure you're imagining it, because there's no way he's tracing such an intimate trail down your sternocleidomastoid, and your head _is_ starting to feel a bit fuzzy. But then it's not just fingers. It's his whole damn hand, cupping the side of your neck, his thumb sliding down your adam's apple like a slow bead of sweat.

Yes, you are definitely a trifle warm. And Dirk is very close to your face. His muted breathing sounds right against your ear and the sharp plastic angles of his mask graze your cheek as he turns his face in toward yours. You wonder if you should be panicking, but everything feels--okay. Yes, you think you're okay with this. You're okay with the feeling of leather against your skin. The rough brush of calluses earned from long hours at his work bench. But should you be?

You feel his other hand settle on your hip, and your back is suddenly flush against one of those gigantic slabs. Funny, you weren't aware you were moving. Through the haze of your general acceptance of the situation, you're dimly aware of your own lightheadedness. You're actually kind of glad for something to lean against, but it does occur to you to be a bit concerned for your health.

"Dirk," you try again, "what the devil do you think you're doing?" That's the rational question here, surely, but you're not overly-invested in the answer.

"You're probably starting to feel pretty dizzy." His fingertips press along the hem of your blazer. "Krypton isn't toxic, but there's enough of it here that it displaces the oxygen. Breathe it long enough, and you'll suffocate. Slowly."

"I thought this wasn't going to be dangerous." A little shortness of breath as he hikes that hem up. His fingers slip underneath.

"Inhaling too much of it has a narcotic effect. Completely reversible, of course. Once you get that oxygen flowing again."

"This is crazy. _You_ 're crazy. I'm putting the mask back on."

"Impairs your reasoning. Induces euphoria. Anxiety. Can make you feel goddamn invincible."

You lift the gas mask again, and he damn near slaps it out of your hands. "Jesus fucking Christ, Dirk!"

"Hysterical," he says, and you think you might be getting there. The calm you felt when he first put his hands on you is ebbing, and you really just want to put this stupid piece of plastic back over your face and have things be normal again.

"Criminy, Strider, if you don't unhand the damned mask, we're going to have more than just words about it! I'll be getting downright uncouth!"

He leans in. Close, until the sharp edges of his mask are scraping over your cheek and the only thing you can hear is the muffled sound of breathing through plastic. That hand is still on your hip, too. And by "on your hip," what you actually mean is "halfway under your shirt." You shudder against it. Grab for his wrist and suck down a big gulp of air that doesn't clear your head at all as the pad of Dirk's thumb presses into the point of your ribs. The slab is hard against your back, and your hand slides up to catch in the crook of his elbow, but you're not really doing anything about the situation unless you count the way in which your head inclines toward his without your permission.

You're surprised when he actually lets go. You're more surprised when his hands retreat to his own mask and push it upward, just enough--you see his mouth, the suggestion of a nose. The top forces the wilder sections of his hair back against his head, and several blond strands jut out in a way you can't imagine he'd be all right with if the two of you were anywhere near a mirror. His arms come around you, maintaining a wide enough berth that they aren't actually touching you, and his palms press flat to the stone near your shoulders. There goes the escape you hadn't quite gotten around to making. And his face is--right there. In front of yours. And you see his mouth open this time before the words come out, and something about the shape it makes around the sounds kicks your heart into overdrive. Or maybe that's the oxygen deprivation.

"There. Better?" You can feel his breath. And then you can feel his lips because they're against yours, and they're very firm and impossibly warm, and it is most definitely not the oxygen deprivation. Dirk Strider is kissing you on the mouth so hard you worry your teeth are cutting the inside of your lip, and there is so little room for you to yank your head back and look scandalized that you don't even try.

You've had serious conversations about it--about the two of you. Together. It was clear to you both that you were coming around, but things were moving slowly. The right speed, as far as you were concerned. A right gentlemanly courtship, and you thought that was okay with him. And now this--your first real kiss (you don't count that severed head mess), and Dirk's thigh has pushed in between your legs. And the cherry topping this ridiculous surprise sundae? You're leaning into it. All of it. The kiss, the brazen thigh, the empty space between the curve of Dirk's body and your own.

It all crashes into you in one spectacular realization, and you panic. You jerk the gas mask up between the two of you and shove it into Dirk's chest, forcing his mouth away, forcing his leg back. You hear your own rapid breathing above the atmosphere's electric pulse, and you aren't sure how to cope with the fire blazing under your skin. And there's Dirk standing opposite you--silent stone at your back and your front, it would seem. Except for his mouth. You can still see it, can see the way his lips stay parted without yours to seal the gap, and it's enough to let you know that he's invested in this. In you. A flush creeps up his neck, and your mask clatters against the tomb floor. His follows when you knock it carelessly from his face, and you feel a brief swell of satisfaction at the wide-eyed expression you reveal. Whatever predictions he made about your reaction to his aggressive courtship, you're throwing them in his face.

You're a little worried you might fall over, but you pull away from the slab anyway and get your fingers into his shirt. You instigate a second kiss, pulling him in against you, and wonder if this is what it feels like to lose your mind. Everything's feverish--his hands hot against your skin, underneath your shirt again as he pushes you back against the stone. You hear plastic go skittering across the ground as he crowds in close, pushes between your thighs again to get his leg up against your crotch. You're pretty sure you can feel the outline of his cock against your hip.

His lips burn a path to your jaw, cross down to your throat to sear the skin along your vein, and you tip your head back to coax the flames. You didn't think you wanted this. What are you doing? Your hands clutch at his back to get him closer. You don't know, but you must have changed your mind. You're flush together, the two of you, and his mouth opens against your skin while he hikes his leg higher. You feel your shorts ride up and you groan. Rock down against him as he sucks at the side of your neck. It's just shy of being too much.

"Dirk--" He doesn't let you. He covers your mouth again, his tongue sliding against the crease where your lips come together. You can feel that electricity against your skin, against your scalp, and you don't think you've ever been as turned on as you are when Dirk rolls his hips into you as though he's done it a hundred times before. As though it's his god-given right, as though he knows you'll like it, and you do. You want him. Hazily, but fiercely. Immediately.

He tugs at your shorts, but with the two of you half-melded together, it's a chore. They're ludicrously tight on their own, and your hard on isn't making things any easier. If he'd take a step back, it would simplify the whole process, but that hardly seems like an option at this point. His hands fumble between you, forcing their way down, and you push yourself against them just as eagerly as you did his thigh. You feel the hard points of his knuckles dig into your crotch as he attempts to make space while giving none, and you break from his mouth to help. Your fingers crowd his, doing the exact opposite, but he finally manages to bypass your "assistance" long enough to get your fly open. The release of pressure forces a hiss through your teeth, and Dirk peels the shorts down over your hips until they're bunched at the tops of your thighs, and he--stops.

"Christ, Jake."

You raise your head to look at him and find his fair skin washed pink and his eyes tactfully trained between your legs.

"You were seriously going commando this whole time?" He almost sounds pained.

You feel the very picture of dignity, standing there panting gently, your exposed cock at full attention under Dirk's gaze. You trust your weight to the stone at your back as an embarrassed heat inches along your neck and consumes both your ears.

"They were too tight," you murmur. Before you can add to your defense, Dirk's mouth is at your throat with a huffed _fuck_ , his tongue dragging wide, wet trails of warmth up your skin as his hand closes around your dick. Your embarrassment dries up like a shallow pond in the face of a brutal drought, and you cant your hips up to push yourself into his grip.

The leather covering his palm sticks to your flesh, and he doesn't attempt to work his hand over you. He uses the pad of his thumb instead, stroking up the side of your cock and rubbing just under the head, following the ridge from one side to the other. It's a little frustrating, actually, not substantial enough to be much more than a tease, and you grab the back of his neck. Squeeze. Dig your stubby nails in and swallow under the scrape of his teeth. Your other hand is up his shirt, flat over his ribs, now dragging down the abs you've never seen but always suspected were there. You feel so _heavy_ , like the slow increase of gravity's force on your limbs is a natural side-effect of your arousal. Dirk's thumb passes across the head of your dick, smearing the wetness there, and you jerk into him.

That's it. You grab hold of the front of his dark jeans and take a very good shot at unbuttoning them with one hand. You don't even come close, so you pull your fingers down the side of his neck and then devote both hands to the partial disrobing of your best friend. You're both breathing hard when you push the denim down his hips, and he swears when you catch the elastic of his boxers on the head of his cock in your graceless haste.

His hand leaves you. His mouth. You almost protest, but he's looking you square in the face now, and his eyes--his _eyes_ , holy shit. You must have noticed before, when the mask came away, but surely they weren't _that_ vibrant. Orange, the curling edges of a hungry flame, his pupils dilated, and you resist a pressing urge to look away. This close, you even spot a few pale freckles.

He grabs your wrists and raises them, guides them back until he can press the lengths of both your forearms to cool stone on either side of your head. When he kisses you this time, it's slower. The path of his tongue more intimate, his thumbs digging into the heels of your palms. His nose and his cheek push your glasses out of place and smear the lenses, and you try to arch your body away from the slab, toward him. He doesn't let you get far but brings himself in close again, and he sucks your lower lip in between his teeth as you feel his cock against yours. It's just a tickle of hot flesh, him sliding against you with nothing to steady either of you, and you groan into his mouth. Pull at your hands and move your hips, trying for more contact. You turn your head.

"Bloody frigging hell, Dirk, don't--"

"I wanted to take it slow," he says, but it's strained. You think he might be apologizing, and he lets go of one wrist. You watch him pull his glove off with his teeth. Leather hits the dusty floor and he spits into his palm, and you know that he is feeling just as desperate and uncertain and out of control as you are. Dirk is not some great orchestrator, a puppet-master always one step ahead of you and tugging you after him. Dirk is nervous and horny and possibly _really_ in love with you, and he doesn't know any more about what he's doing than you do. He wraps his wet hand as far as it can reach around you both and pulls upward.

You suck in a breath as he rubs his palm over your slit, over his own, then drags that extra lubrication down sensitive flesh. You grab a fistful of his shirt at the small of his back and tug, stretching the material thoughtlessly and trying to thrust into his hand. You want your other hand back, and you try and wrench it free to let him know, but he's too busy rubbing against you, too busy trying to coordinate the movement of his hand and his hips, and his breath is damp against your ear.

Someone else's hand is one thing--free from your own influence, unpredictable, unfamiliar, rough and warm and _good_ \--but feeling another dick moving against your own is unbelievable. Nothing you ever thought you would want, but the increasingly slick sensation of Dirk thrusting against you is getting you a lot hotter than your nighttime fantasies of salacious blue babes ever has.

You feel him shiver beneath your hand, and he pushes his forehead to yours, now jerking the two of you more steadily. It's difficult to find any real rhythm between fucking his hand and rutting against him like you are, but you're sure as hell not going to stop trying. Every little gasp from him, every hitch in his breathing, every grunt that sounds like the beginning of your name makes your dick throb, and you're really doing a number on his shirt.

Dirk's grip on your arm tightens for a moment and is gone, migrating to your ass where he tugs you up against him and squeezes. Your hand plunges immediately down between your straining bodies to complete the circle his fingers can't quite close, and a harsh grind of his hips into you tells you that was the right choice. It's tight between you, and sweaty, and there are wet places on your shirt where one thrust or another has left precum on the fabric. You're both breathing harder than you should be, and you gulp down air between the embarrassing noises you're making to try and compensate. It doesn't help much, but you don't really notice.

"Jake." It's a groan, a breath across your upper lip, and the only way you ever want to hear him say your name again. You attack his mouth, sucking his lips and pushing your tongue between them, and his meets you as the force of his hips drives you against the stone.

You can't really move your hands anymore. The two of you are too close together, and so you clench your ass and jerk against his cock, against his hand, your own, over and over, until your kiss is so broken by gasping and the need to repeat his name that you give up and tuck your face against his collar. His cheek presses to your hair, and the two of you rock together furiously until you know you can't do it anymore. You try to say something--you're supposed to, aren't you?--but it's already too late, and you're arching into him, moaning loudly into his shirt and squeezing your eyes shut as you come, every muscle tensed.

You feel the new warmth between you, feel it spread as Dirk continues to move against you. You ride out your orgasm with his nails biting into your ass.

"Jake," like before. "Oh, fuck, Jake--" His hips stutter against you and still as he pins you to the slab with the weight of his whole body, taut against you, impossibly solid. He lets loose a noise that makes your stomach flip. You feel his cock pulse against yours with his hand snug around you both. Each wave is a shudder against you, his hand pulling up over sensitive flesh, milking the pleasure for both of you until he finally slumps against your chest.

He slips his hand out from between you and braces his arm against the stone to take some of the weight off you, and his grip on your ass gives, flattening into a much gentler touch. You release your death hold on his shirt in return (though the damage there has already been done), and your other arm you let hang by your side. You try to wipe a little of the mess on your hand off onto the slab, but rock doesn't make a very good towel. All you really manage to do is get grit stuck to your fingers.

You don't look at Dirk. Your head is still filled with fog, and now that the pleasure is ebbing, you feel very dizzy. Your breathing hasn't calmed down all that much, either, and you really just want to have a seat here on the nice tomb floor and take a rest. You feel Dirk move back a little, and you're dimly aware of what a disaster must be all over your shirt, but you don't look at that either. Without him holding you to the slab, you're really devoting most of your attention to the riddle that is standing upright when your legs are made of jelly.

Dirk takes your hand and presses a handkerchief into it, and it finally occurs to you to feel a bit ashamed standing here with your shorts in a bunch, come all over your hand and your shirt, your flagging dick still exposed. You go scarlet and pull away from him, wiping off your hand, wiping off your shirt with less success, and cleaning off your stomach and your crotch before tucking yourself into your shorts and tugging them back up your hips. The motion makes you wobble, pitch forward, and Dirk stops your wipeout with a strong hand against your chest. That's when you notice he isn't looking at you, either.

"You okay?" There's a second kerchief clutched in his free hand. You didn't know he even carried kerchiefs, but you guess you're grateful. Not that you both don't still look like you just--well, like you did what you just did. Or maybe that's the awful smudging on your glasses talking.

"I don't know," you say, and he removes his hand. "I'm lightheaded." You drop the soiled handkerchief.

You feel more than see him stand awkwardly in front of you for a moment, like he's waiting to make sure you're not going to hit the floor as soon as he steps away, and then you hear his feet shuffle across the tomb floor. You glance up in time to see him scooping first your mask, then his own from the dust.

"You need to put this back on," he says, and thrusts the hunk of green plastic toward you. You stare down at it for a moment before taking it, and there's a very unpleasant tightness in the pit of your stomach. The two of you just had sex. Of a sort, anyway. You were-- _intimate_. The evidence is drying at the bottom of your shirt. And you have absolutely no idea how you feel about it.

When you look up from your mask, Dirk has already put his on. There's that impassive, unreadable, maddening pair of shades again. Like always. You don't feel well. And it's more than the dizziness, the dirtiness, the tiredness in your limbs. It's those stupid glasses he's always hiding behind. You want to grab his mask by the filter and pull it off. You want to see surprise again on that insufferably calm face. You want him to be desperate again, to want you, to _react_. You want--

"Jake?"

His hand is warm on your shoulder. When you don't respond, he pushes his mask back from his face and looks at you with furrowed brows. "Come on. Put it on and we'll head back. Get cleaned up for real." He reaches up and strokes his fingers along the edge of your jaw, and the motion is so much more hesitant than the rocking of his hips or the hot press of his mouth. "And--talk."

He takes the mask from you and holds it carefully to your face, fumbling one-handed for the straps at the back of your head. You let him.

"I'm sorry," he says as he pulls the straps into place. Tightens them. It's so quiet, the electric hum nearly swallows it.

The last glimpse you get of his face is troubled. You think maybe he looks upset. Uncertain and a little sick, and then it's all hidden from view.

Maybe he really is sorry. Yes, actually. You think so. Have you ever seen him wear an expression like that?

"Let's go," he says. He's not touching you now. In fact, he's standing several feet away, between you and the stairwell. Waiting.

You take a series of deep breaths and join him.

"Yeah," you say, and slip your hand into his.

**Author's Note:**

> HOLY CRAP oh my god tumblr user shadesofdirk drew [this](http://shadesofdirk.tumblr.com/post/44576253638) amazing wonderful perfect fanart that i absolutely do not deserve <3 thank you so much!


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